At our Alaskan lodges, we tend to eat a lot of salmon (shocking, we know). Not only do we serve it a bunch of different ways for dinner, but our guests also have the option of a shore lunch – where your guide prepares a fresh salmon you caught that very morning.

Those of you that have joined us at Alaska West of late probably recognize the name Ben West, better known around camp as ‘Big Country.’ Not only is Ben a great guide, but he also cooks a mean shore lunch, and today he shares his favorite recipe for cooking salmon over an open fire.

Big Country’s Shore Lunch Salmon Recipe

As many who have fished with me know, I love to do shore lunches. It can be a great way to take a little break, enjoy a fire and a hot lunch. Salmon on the river is just as good as it gets. I love to fish, I love to cook, and most importantly I love to eat. How else do you think I got to be six foot four? So, today I would like to share my go to recipe for a salmon shore lunch.

2 Large pieces of heavy duty aluminum foil Metal grill grate to put on top of coals

The first step is to build a nice large fire. I like to build it bigger than expected, because the light wood we find in Western Alaska burns fast. While the fire burns down to coals, I fillet the salmon and prep each fillet on top of its own sheet of aluminum foil. I like to mix my sugar, herbs, and spices beforehand and have them ready to go in a ziploc bag.

To prep, I like to liberally cover the fish in the seasoning mix. Then, I lay the slices of butter evenly down each fillet, followed by the onions and tomatoes. The fish is then ‘enveloped’ in the foil by folding it up over the top of the fillet, and inward on the sides making it ready to cook.

Once the coals have started to burn down, I stir the coals around creating a nice even heat source. I place the foil wrapped fillets, skin side down on a metal grill grate, then place the grate on top of the coals. Cook about 12-15 minutes and check. Note, I generally serve the tail portion of the fillet first, as it cooks faster, then give the rest of the fillet a few more minutes, and eat as ready.

Salmon are returning home to rivers across the northwest right now, so we figured it’s a good time to share another salmon recipe. Whether you’re bringing fish home from a trip to a healthy, well-managed fishery, or you’re bringing fish home from the supermarket (wild salmon only, please) we think you should give this one a try – it’s one of our favorites.

Fishing and friends go hand in hand. This recipe is doubly favorite because it was told to your editor by our dear friend Dec Hogan. Thanks, Dec!

Grilled Smoked Salmon

Fresh fillet of sockeye or silver salmon, skin on

Table salt

Wood chips – fruit wood or cottonwood

As you can see, this recipe is much more about the preparation than the ingredients!

Two to four hours before mealtime, cover the meat side of the fillet with salt. We mean cover it – there shouldn’t be piled-up dry salt anywhere, but every little spot of flesh should have salt on it. The first time you do this, you’re going to think to yourself, “I’m ruining this fish by putting too much salt on it.” Just enough to cover it in salt, without having any dry salt piled up. Use normal table salt, not kosher or rock salt – that would make it much too salty.

Stick the fillet in the fridge. The layer of salt will create a mini-brine – it’ll draw the moisture out of the outer layer of flesh, where it’ll pool up. More on this later.

Fire up your grill to your standard grilling temperature. We like 400 degrees, but every Grillmaster is different.

Put a batch of wood chips on the grill and get them hot enough that they’re bellowing out smoke. You can wrap them in foil and poke holes in it, or you can use a metal smoker box (our preferred option, pictured above), or you can use the super fancy smoker box that’s attached to your grill that we can’t afford. Dec uses cottonwood chips. We usually use some kind of fruitwood blend, just because it’s easier to find.

Put the fillet skin-side down on your grill, and grill it just like you would normally grill salmon. Keep the lid closed. Don’t flip it. We typically go 10 – 12 minutes at 400 degrees for a normal sockeye or silver fillet.

That’s it! By pulling the moisture out of the outer layer of flesh with the salt, the moisture gets sealed into the fillet – the flesh won’t pull apart and leak juices like it normally does when you cook salmon. The flavor winds up being somewhere in between fresh and smoked salmon, and the flesh is about as moist and tender as any salmon you’ll ever eat.

Over the years working at Alaska West, Chris Price has experimented with a few salmon sashimi brines.

His first sashimi brine was kind of an oriental style, using orange juice and teriyaki. It was delicious, but the orange flavor and the sweetness of the teriyaki were a little overpowering.

After further thought, Chris has come up with a new combination of ingredients that gives just a hint of flavors. Over the past two seasons this sashimi has been added to the appetizer menu, and due to popular demand…here is the recipe!

Salmon Sashimi

Ingredients

2 – 3 medium salmon fillets (Jack King or Coho are ideal)

½ gallon apple juice

¼ cup lemon pepper

¼ cup salt

2 Tbsp dry dill weed

Honey

Cracked black pepper

Brine method

Skin and debone salmon fillets. You may cut them in half if you desire.

Combine apple juice, lemon pepper, salt, dill weed and mix well.

Put fillets in a flat container such as a casserole pan – glass is best. (Chris puts his fillets inside a clear plastic bag and then lays the bag in a casserole pan or on a baking sheet.)

Pour liquid over the fillets. If in a bag, squeeze out excess air and tie off the bag.

Let fillets brine 48 hours, flipping the fillets after 24 hours.

After brining, pull fillets out of brine, rinsing off excess dill weed with the brine itself. Do not rinse with water.

Pat dry the fillets with paper towel.

Drizzle the fillets with honey and rub in. At first the honey will not want to stick, but keep rubbing and it will soon coat the fillet.

Sprinkle the fillets with cracked black pepper to your liking.

Vacuum the fillets and freeze solid.

Serving

Take fillet out of freezer and let thaw slightly.

Thinly slice the fillet at a bias angle for the best presentation. It is important to slice the fillet while frozen.

A lot of our salmon recipes are pretty simple grilled or baked preparations. This one comes from a different angle, and we think you’re really going to like it!

Creamy Salmon Twists

This may be one of the best cold salmon salads I have ever eaten and I have had more than a few. My father-in-law, Richard Sisler, came up with this little mix a while back and I dream of it a lot. This recipe makes great use of any leftover salmon, smoked or not, but you could also pull out a new smoked salmon fillet for it as well.

This is great to take out on the river with you for a little midday snack eaten on paper plates with plastic forks, but it goes incredibly well at a fancy dinner with family and friends as well.

Mike Sanders is our General Manager at Deneki Outdoors. He’s pushing 19 years with Alaska West, and he knows his salmon. We asked him to write up his family’s favorite salmon recipe, and he was happy to oblige.

Salmon at the Sanders House

The Sanders family eats a lot of salmon. We eat salmon as frequently as pizza, actually we probably eat more salmon than pizza – salmon is on the menu at our house at least once a week. Salmon is a big part of our lives. Our 3 sons Ryan, Dylan and Robby all learned the ethic of working for their food when they were very young. They have been involved in harvesting fish for our family since they could stand stable enough to not be pulled into the river while fighting fish, even when they were so small that we tied their life jackets to the shore.

We put up a lot of fish each summer – between 150 and 200 pounds of processed sockeye fillets. We can it, smoke it, vacuum pack and freeze it. We eat more salmon that any other form of meat not just because we have to – we really do enjoy it. The boys being such a big part of the process may have affected their taste for salmon – but whatever, we all love it and we prepare it a ton of different ways. This is one of our family favorites.

Deep Fried Salmon

Chunk up skinned salmon that has had the pin bones removed into 1 to 1½ inch cubes.

Dust the chunks in flour.

Dip the salmon in your favorite fish batter. We have tried a lot of different batters from tempura and panko to traditional fish and chips batters – they are all good. This recipe from the Food Network includes the batter Rob and Dylan like best. You can use club soda instead of beer – I can’t taste the difference.

Drop the battered salmon into a hot Fry Daddy deep fryer (we have graduated to a larger fryer now but a Fry Daddy works great for small batches) and cook it until the batter is light brown. It doesn’t take long and depends on the chuck size, but it’s normally 2 to 4 minutes per batch.

A couple of months ago we re-added to the Deneki Outdoors team a fairly legendary character. Bryan Burke (a.k.a. “Smoothy” for you long-time Alaska West faithful) guided for Alaska West back in the days before Ricky Martin was even Livin’ La Vida Loca. Bryan’s back, working in our Anchorage office and helping anglers plan epic fishing trips around the world.

Knowing that Bryan has captured a few salmon in his day, we asked him for his favorite salmon recipe, and he sent along…

South Of The Border Salmon

I like to cook my fillets in what I call a “tin foil cooker”. Take two sheets of foil several inches longer than the fillet, and make two quarter inch folds on each edge – locking them together. Then, fold a one inch lip on all four sides and bend a triangle in the corners to make it into a pan. Insert fillet, skin side down.

Now for the spread – evenly coat the salmon fillet with olive oil and gently rub in the taco seasoning. Next, mix the sour cream and salsa together in a separate bowl and spread it over your rub. I like to add onions just for the moisture content and, well… I like onions.

The cover is a single sheet of foil, folded into the edges of the pan, sealing everything in. Place over hot coals or a barbecue grill. It’s done when the cover puffs out like a Jiffy popcorn pan.

Today we continue our series of recipes from our team at Alaska West – a bunch of folks who get the chance to partake in beautiful fresh wild salmon quite a lot in the course of a summer…

Jim Palmersheim quickly became a fan favorite on our guide staff a few years back. Not only is he a talented guide and a super guy to spend time with on the water…he makes a cup of riverside espresso so tasty that folks have literally been known to drive around the Kanektok looking for him, hoping to talk him out of a cup!

Simple Salmon by Jim

I’m a firm believer in the K.I.S.S! program. I prepare my salmon for a shore lunch pretty much the way I prepare it at home.

Vilma Sisler has been part of the Deneki Outdoors team for the past 6 years, traveling with her husband Rick and now with future angler Elias between Alaska West and Andros South. We know firsthand about Vilma’s talent in the kitchen, so we were pretty darned excited when she stepped up with one of her favorite salmon recipes.

Place the fish on a baking pan, or if you’re lucky enough to be on a river somewhere, then use the pouch method with tin foil. Add half of the oregano and salt directly to the meat, then add the onion & cover with tomato. Next add more oregano, salt, pepper and the butter. Finally place in the oven for no more than 5 minutes. When the salmon is almost done it is time to add the cheese on top, cook for a minute more and then it’s done.

This is a meal in itself, but would go just fine with a little side of potatoes or rice and some veggies. Enjoy!